Romy Etude 5
by jpraner
Summary: Anna and Kurt run a cargo vessel working for Raven. Watch events unfold when they lose some valuable goods and need some professional help to reacquire it. Please R
1. Chapter 1

My continued efforts to write Romy in space. I continue to build a universe that is half my own for this purpose. I hope you are not put off by some of the original cities and characters. Many of them are repeated from other pieces, since deleted. There's a brief nod to Rita from Ludi's House of Cards. If you haven't read Ludi's work...do so immediately.

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…_be careful. All his smiles are lies. _

It was that one sentence at the end of the message that allowed her to identify Etienne Marceaux. When she stood at the doorway of the Hellfire Club, the dusty watering hole inside of Station 12 that tided travelers over till New Madripoor, she saw so…so many, dangerous looking men, clad in the casual utilitarian outfits of smugglers, and mercenaries, and other dubious professions. Some were cleaner than others, some sharper. Some were sullen, squinting, sideways glancing, quiet. All shuffled in together with one another, and with traders, and whores, and old men full of war stories. And when one or the other shot her one of those sullen, squinting, sideways glances, his eyes lingered for only a moment before returning to his pool cue or his drink or his prostitute.

She sidled down the stairs, feeling obvious in this temple of subtlety.

A glass shattered behind the bar. A short chorus of baritone laughter rose and fell over a game of cards in a back corner. There was a low chatter and hum mingled with the scent of working men: sweat and hydraulic fluid and cigarette smoke and cologne and booze.

Her eyes swept the room one more time.

_His name is Etienne, but don't be surprised if he has an alias. He's about six feet, lanky, red/brown hair, kinda shaggy. He wears a coat all the time…a long brown coat. He smokes like a fucking refinery. It's been years since I seen him, so I don't know…best a luck to you I guess. It's a one in a million chance if you find him. But if you do, be careful…_

A man caught her eye, looking over his shoulder as her gaze passed across him. He looked at her for a second. Then another. Then smiled half of a lazy, knowing smile while he raised a cigarette to his lips. It seemed for a moment that everything moved slower. She was about to smile back…when another glass shattered, making her start imperceptibly, shaking her into wakefulness. It was just her own weariness dragging at her heels, she thought. And she was weary. So weary. And she needed to rest.

She walked toward him with enough purpose that he straightened a little and turned to meet her approach. His face spelled out his curiosity as she drew up to him, stopping a few feet away from him, and speaking. No savvy, no style, no artifice, no guile…"You Etienne?"

…_innocent._

He raised his eyebrows and took a sip of his drink.

"I could be."

His reply threw her off balance and there was a pause that stretched into awkwardness. She admonished herself silently for her momentary fluster. Years later she would remember that moment and think to herself. _I should have ordered a drink…no…I should have asked him to buy me a drink. _Or, _I should have just kept on talking, like I already knew who he was. _The silence, evidence of her ineptitude in all the matters which seemed to be important for life and living, made her feel her age: young, perhaps too young.

She took hold of herself at last. "Well." She continued, grabbing a cocktail napkin "If you are Etienne," and she smiled a beguiling sarcastic smile that claimed to know the secrets of any one it lighted upon, she wrote down her ship's dock number, "Then you can get a hold of me here, but only for the next two days." She pushed the napkin a few inches toward him, turned, turned back, "My ship's name is Rogue.", turned again, and walked away without so much as a backward glance.

He looked after her as she sauntered away, all sultry bravado, selling it a little too hard, but not too hard for him to buy. He knocked his head back and finished his bourbon in one swallow, then folded the napkin and slid it into his pocket.

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	2. Chapter 2

Her footsteps echoed hollowly on the catwalk up to the ship, on the metal floor of the bay, all the way to the solitary cockpit, where she sat and began her vigil. Two days on this station, to fuel up and get supplies, to meet with Kurt, and perhaps to gain some expertise to help them "re-acquire" their lost cargo from Bastion. Smuggling had never been her favorite means of making money, but the few times she engaged in it she knew in no uncertain terms that losing cargo, no matter which way you happened to do it, was the surest way to a slit throat, or a busted hull, or some other mode of death. Smuggling for Raven, though rare and a safer bet than most, still had its own unsavory drawbacks. And though she could smuggle, she could not steal, not from this particular dupe - so she needed a thief.

"The best one around." She had said to the fence from her last haul. She hadn't expected an answer. It was a statement of fact and a declaration of understanding. She knew her situation. The woman, Rita, had looked at her with an assessing, compassionate air and pulled a sheet of brown wrapping paper out from under the counter. She scribbled a note on it and passed it to her, then added, "The best one around…if you can find him."

Did she need to go to all this trouble? She could have gone back home empty handed, to be mercilessly admonished, to be parted from her ship, perhaps forever, to be given some repetitive administrative task to perform for the rest of her life, but at least not killed. She didn't want to comprehend the consequences of failure, so she grasped at this last straw and made arrangements to be where this thief was, or at least where he was rumored to be.

A pale flash of light caught her eye, woke her from her reverie - a bit of debris floating through space outside of the windshield. It rotated slowly, peacefully, revealing a colza yellow, and on the other side, a dull silver. Perhaps a piece of billboard that came loose from the station. She watched it turn and turn again three times before it floated out of view. Watching it drift made her feel quiet inside and she wondered at its fate. She hoped sanitation bots wouldn't find it and scavenge it up, though that was its most likely fate. She hoped it would float out into the wilds of space where it could gently loll over and over forever.

Her musings overtook again her for a time, and when she shook herself free it was only by the power of her own exhaustion. She made the lonely, echoing trek to her quarters and nestled into bed to be met by dream filled sleep; dreams in which she wandered through a maze of pale stone hallways and pine doors, all identical, and somehow, some miraculous way, she knew her way around. She felt safe, but sad and lonely. It was the sort of loneliness that drove prisoners and shipwrecked sailors to madness. She began to run through the corridors looking for one door in particular. She found it. She pushed down the handle to open it. And then she woke up.

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	3. Chapter 3

He admitted to himself that he was curious. Curious enough to check out her ship among other things, so he stayed at the bar till closing and in the early hours of the morning made his way down the docking corridor to the ship named ROGUE. He liked the name.

The security interface at the passenger access door was standard and he was able to override it after a few minutes of tinkering. There was a small hydraulic hiss signaling his success and he pulled the door down in one strong fluid motion.

The inside was about what he expected. There was a lower level cargo bay with catwalks above that seemed to lead to rooms, and one obviously led to the cockpit. The bay was empty so he crept quietly up the grated stairs and inspected the living areas. The cockpit was small, seated two comfortably, with four jump seats that could be pulled out of the wall. Everything was tidy and put away but it wasn't too sterile. A bobble head doll of a little geisha girl stood, glued to the dash between the seats, and a few popular books rested in a console cubby along with some pens and gum.

He picked one up. _Sanctuary - _Faulkner_. _He supposed that was impressive. He looked at the next one, _Reforming a Rake, _and laughed silently to himself, then turned to inspect the rest of the ship. Following the ringed catwalk around he came to an open area with comfortable chairs and a side table that faced out at a large viewing window. After that came rooms with closed sliding doors. One, two, with nothing inside but bare shelves, then three…this one was slid ajar a few inches and he peeked inside. The girl was right there, illuminated by the distant lights of the station shining through the cockpit windows, lying on a foam mat on the floor under a thin cotton blanket facing him, so that he sucked a breath in when he saw her, but her eyes were closed and she was sleeping peacefully. He looked at her for a long time, then by the power of some fey impulse he crept a little closer, first crouching, then moving forward on hands and knees.

She was beautiful, and like all beautiful creatures she was even more striking while asleep, when all care and worry was far away and there was nothing on her face but the blissful expression of the innocent at rest. Or so it always seemed to him. He let his eyes wander down the silhouette of her body, the cleavage pressed up by her arms and peeking through her thin tank top. He lingered a little too long and felt like he should be ashamed but wasn't…then that he should be ashamed for not being ashamed…but wasn't…and so on. The tale-spin of absurd reduction that happens when we desire to have different desires.

He pulled back to a crouch, then stood, turned, and walked on to the fourth door finding the same bare accommodations as the first two rooms. He assumed that she lived alone on this ship, which seemed unlikely, but all the evidence pointed to it, and he wanted to believe his pretty would-be employer might need an itch scratched.

After the rooms there was another open space that housed a kitchen and dining area. The counters were bare but the cupboards were full of dehydrated goodies, which he perused at length, stashing a few food bars in his pockets. The refrigerator even had some fresh oranges in it so he decided to help himself to one…call it an advanced payment, but as he reached for it he heard the telltale click and whine of a plasma rifle behind him.

_Fuck. _

He had already started to raise his hands when the man behind him spoke.

"Hands where I can see them." Came the slightly accented voice. Strangely he was less worried about being caught than he was annoyed that there was a man floating around.

"Turn around _slowly_."

He gracefully pivoted on his heels in a slow half circle like a ballet dancer might. The man pointing the rifle at him was lean and swarthy, perhaps his own height with black hair and striking brown eyes so pale they would be called golden.

"Who do you work for." The rifleman said.

He had expected "Who are you." "What are you doing here." "Why shouldn't I kill you?" Or something of the like. Instead "Who do you work for?" It betrayed some hidden secret of identity or affiliation. It was…interesting.

"I work for myself homme." A recent truth that both thrilled him and terrified him to admit.

"So you're robbing us."

"Non," He said in a placating tone, "jus' checkin' you out is all. Your lady friend inquired about my services." And he gave an impertinent stare meant to intimidate any boyfriend. The rifleman seemed unphased however and instead tilted his head slightly and called out a name.

"Anna!"

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	4. Chapter 4

There was some sound coming from the bay downstairs, but not enough to fully wake her, only enough to intrude on her dreams.

"Anna?!...Liebchen?"

Kurt's voice roused her at last and she gazed at her three-faced clock. 12:30PM Jura, 7:00AM Madripoor, 4:30AM Station Time. She sighed heavily. He had obviously returned some time in the night…just now, it sounded like.

"Wuuuuut! Jesus Christ Kurt!" Her voice was thick and groggy. Kurt could come and go as he pleased. He had all the codes for the ship. What reason could he have for waking her while they were locked and docked?

"Come here, bitte!" His voice was calm with a trace of urgency in it. Something was wrong. Her mind pulled into sharp focus and she jumped out of bed in her tank top and pajama pants. She ran painfully in bare feet along the grating to the kitchenette where Kurt was pointing his plasma rifle at someone leaning casually against the counter, a hand on the edge to either side of him.

"Etienne?" She was pleasantly surprised for a split second…then angry with herself. How dangerous it had been to solicit a criminal and give him her address. How foolish. How god-damn stupid. And she felt again what she had felt in the bar: too young.

"You know him?" Kurt's rifle flagged for a moment.

"No. Keep your gun on him." She said and Kurt snapped his eye back to the scope of the rifle, completely unnecessary at this range, but it was a force of habit that the thief took note of.

"How do you know his name?" Kurt asked.

"I…I don't."

"What?"

"I mean…someone recommended him to me. But it looks like I should've been a little more careful getting references." She added sarcastically.

The man watched and smiled at the entire exchange, then finally spoke: "My apologies chere. I didn't come to rob de place if dat's what you're thinkin'." She noticed his accent for the first time.

"Then what are you here for?"…_Was it_ _Cajun?_

"Someone was lookin' for me. I just wanted to know a little more about dem is all. Didn't know your man would come back at four in de morning. Didn't t'ink you had a man. Shoulda known better." He shrugged and smiled at her.

Kurt looked at her out of the corner of his eyes. "What is he talking about?" But she only looked at the thief. She felt exposed and crossed her arms to cover her self.

"An' what do you think after casin' this place"…she said it this time…"Cajun."

His smile dipped a little bit then recovered with a new tint of insolence. He looked her up and down in a way that irritated Kurt and made her clutch her elbows tighter.

"I don' t'ink you work for de Union." He bantered back lazily, as if no weapon were trained on him.

"Is the Union what yah so scared of?" She let her own accent slip and she saw his face light with comprehension.

"Schwester?" Kurt asked quietly, but she said nothing, did not even register that he had spoken.

At the word the man shifted and looked between her and Kurt who was getting annoyed without bothering to hide it. Kurt pulled the rifle back and held it casually at port arms. At last the man looked back to her.

"I don't scare too easy, and I'll take de job. If you can pay me, dat is."

"Oh yeah? What's your price?" She asked.

"Depends on de haul."

Their unhurried back and forth pushed Kurt's confusion to critical mass. They knew each other, and something shady was going on between them, but he wasn't going to get any answers just now. Anna handled all the business on the ship and it was obvious that this was business of some kind. He brusquely handed her the rifle and walked over to the cupboard, fishing out a nutrient bar, then pulled a cup out to make coffee.

"So dat's your brother?"

She nodded.

"And he got a German accent and you got a' Alabama accent."

"Mississippi."

"Ah…Not too many with either o' those these days."

"Well…I generally don't take it out for show and tell."

"Heh…yea' you sound all polished up like a silver spoon…a pity…My guess is you gotta talk pretty for your boss or some t'ing?"

"Something' like that." His prescience annoyed her. "Look I'm not happy you broke into my ship but if we're going to work together then you would have to be here eventually anyways. I don't care how you got on because I assume that breaking into shit is just a thing you do. But I don't trust you farther than I can throw you so if you try anything I'll blow a hole right through you. Me or Kurt. Don't think you can get the drop on us."

Kurt nodded along unconsciously.

"What, you mean twice?" said the Cajun.

"If getting held up in a kitchen is your idea of getting a drop on someone." She had him but she felt self-conscious, like he saw right through her and knew how much posing and posturing she threw out hoping to look like a professional.

"I know what you think…" She said.

"Do you?"

"I know you think I'm stupid."

"Not stupid, chere."

"Naïve."

"Yes."

"Fine then…I'm not as naïve as you think."

"If you say so p'tit."

Her eyes narrowed. She was too tired to keep playing at semantics.

"We leave tomorrow…er…today...at 10ST. I'll explain the job when I see you next, but I'm going to sleep now." She walked away from him as she had done in the bar and she gambled in doing so. Perhaps it was her "naïveté" or perhaps it was her faith in Rita's recommendation but she would let him show himself out and pray that that was all he did.

He peered after her for a few moments and let out a long low whistle. Kurt cleared his throat and eyeballed him for a second before offering him coffee and dehydrated breakfast. He declined and graciously excused himself.

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	5. Chapter 5

At 10ST when she headed to the cockpit with her freshly pressed coffee she found the thief already sitting in the co-pilot's seat with his feet thrown up on the dash. He looked up and over his shoulder at her and smiled.

"Mornin' p'tit. You gonna tell me the tale o' dis get you need got."

She felt off balance yet again but gathered herself quickly. She set her coffee down, took her jacket from off the back of her chair, put it on slowly, stalling. He watched her display of self-control with the same infuriating look of knowing.

"Yes." She said simply after her few moments of pretense. She sat down and took a sip of her coffee, as though it were perfectly natural that he should be sitting there with her. "You know a pirate named Bastion?"

"Mebbe…what he tell you bout' me?"

She snapped her head around to look at him but couldn't tell if he was joking or not…decided he was joking…mostly. He still smiled but no longer looked at her, just toyed with his lighter…click…click…click.

"How well do you know him?"

"Well enough." Click.

She thought about his answer and a sense of foreboding crept over her akin to fear. As though he sensed it, he suddenly looked up at her, and with an oddly neutral expression said "Don't worry p'tit. I'll take good care o' you."

It was the first time he'd spoken to her with a straight face and yet somehow she imagined it was more suggestive than anything else he had said. She could feel a blush rising and she hurried out of her seat and back to the kitchenette. 'I am imagining this' she thought to herself. And in an effort to remain nonchalant she called back to him asking if he wanted any coffee. He assented and she topped off her own as well adding cream and sugar to both as was her habit.

When she returned and sat back down her face was under control. She handed him his coffee and he peered into the pale brown liquid. She was about to continue with her story when he commented, "How'd y' know how I like my coffee chere?"

An impulse of mischief seized her. "You seem like the kind of man who enjoys a little sugah in the mornin'." She parried, accent and all.

He slowly turned his head 90 degrees to look at her with a pleasantly surprised expression and took a sip of his too sweet coffee. She glanced at him briefly and continued.

"We were picking up some…cargo…"

Her pause made him curious and he interrupted. "What was it?" When she did not reply he added, "I gotta know what I'm stealin'."

"Adamantium."

He whistled. "How much?"

"4 tonnes."

At that he exhaled sharply.

"What is it?"

"Jus' wonderin' how I'm gonna move 4 tonnes of adamantium."

"With a palate jack." She replied simply, but immediately got the feeling she had said something foolish once again when she saw his sideways glance. "Anyways…we were picking up this cargo from Izmar…They turned all those old sewers into mines…after the corps 'cleaned them out'. They've been shipping adamantium and rare earths out of it since last fall. We were supposed to divert them to Jura, but Bastion beat us to it. He held us up at our pick up point. The cargo never even touched the ship.

"Its cute how you keep callin' it 'cargo'"

She paused a beat and stuttered out, "But it…it is…that's what it is." Then bit her lip to stop herself from babbling.

He lifted his hands defensively. "S'ok…call it whatever you want chere."

There was a brief pause while she gathered herself. "Soooo…we need to find the…cargo." Now saying the word slowly and self-consciously. He chuckled at her. "But Bastion has probably moved it already…so we need to get it from his fence and I think I know who that is."

"I was gonna say…you sound kinda screwed 'less you know his buyer. Who you 't'ink it is?"

"I don't know his real name. They call him Sinister. They say he does all kinds of…"

"I know what he does." He broke in solemnly, almost angrily. Then he added, "We should try Bastion first."

"I doubt he still has it." She repeated dismissively.

"Worth a shot…better than Sinny."

"You have a pet name for him?" She was ashamed of her own astonishment.

"Yup." was all he said. All seriousness. No more sarcasm or levity.

Just then she heard Kurt clomping around in the bay.

"By the way Cajun…you best make nice with my brother. He's a good man to have on your side."

He nodded soberly and stood up and away from the co-pilot's chair moving to a jump seat nestled between two girders. She could feel him behind her and she didn't like not being able to see him. He was too slippery, too mercurial. She needed to have her eyes on him. Needed it for her peace of mind.

"Morgen." Kurt nodded to him as he passed then sat down next to Anna. "Are we going home? Or have you two formulated a plan?" He craned his neck around to look at the thief.

"I t'ink we go to Kitra, eh chere?"

She picked up on his cue and began the egress protocol. Kurt looked over at her and she nodded without moving her gaze.

"How long can you avoid mutter?" he half whispered to her.

"As long as I have to."

Kurt leaned back in his seat and said nothing.

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	6. Chapter 6

It was normally a three-day trip to get from Sation 12 to Kitra but she paid the exorbitant fee to use a jump port, though they all hated it. She always had the impression she had been taken apart and put back together on the other side and it left her unsettled and a little nauseous. All in all, the journey took three hours. An economy of time she found barely conceivable. The technology of jump gates never crossed her mind until the few times she had needed to use one. What a miracle they must have been, allowing mankind to travel the universe.

"You know de far west airfield? Song Xiu?" The thief said.

"Yeah." Anna replied.

"Go to dat one."

Wordlessly she obeyed, pulling up the coordinates from her address library. The ship settled into its new course, giving them an hour or so on autopilot before she would actually need to sit in the pilots seat and respond to the traffic controllers. She got up and wandered back to the bay, stomach churning. It seemed like everything was going too fast. A day ago she truly thought she would crawl home to Raven on her hands and knees to accept her punishment. But she needed to try – she needed to do her due diligence and somehow things were _happening_. Her trajectory had changed. It had changed back in that bar but she hadn't felt it till now. She ran her hands through her hair and walked in wide slow circles around the cargo hold. Then there was the thief…he unbalanced her, made her feel out of control, made her feel just slightly uncomfortable whenever he looked at her. She couldn't decide if she trusted him or not.

"Anna." Kurt's voice, as always, set her on solid ground. "What's wrong?"

"Just a little nervous is all. I think Bastion's gonna have some security and all that adamantium is gonna be hard to move. But if I go back to momma empty handed…"

"She'll forgive you."

"Ha…Not killing someone is a different thing than forgvin' someone."

"She'll forgive you…eventually." Said Kurt.

Raven was a hard woman and though she loved her children she was not prone to displays of affection or the giving of unearned praise. Her esteem was hard to earn and hard to hold and somehow it was addictive to the both of them. They would risk all they had not to incur her ire, but more so, not loose their footing on the little pedestals she had made for them.

"I guess I'm just scared about this whole thing. I've carried goods but I've never gotten the goods. And sneakin' under the Union's radar isn't all that tricky. Maybe I've had it easy for too long."

"Ja…I know what you mean…"

"And it's movin' so fast. We haven't planned anything. What the fuck is gonna happen? I'm just gonna knock on his door an ask for our adamantium back?"

Kurt looked down and kicked at the floor with the toe of his boot. "Not just you Anna. You and me and…" He gestured up to the cockpit…"You hired a professional thief for god's sake."

She visibly shivered and Kurt put his arms around her, held her in a tender and filial embrace while she shook. "Das ist nicht du wie."

"I know, I'm sorry. I don't know what's gotten into me." She pulled away from him and shook her arms out. Turned in a full circle to face him again. "I'll get it together. I just need a minute. Go back to the helm and keep an eye on the Cajun."

He complied and tromped off to let her sort through her thoughts alone for a few more minutes.

In the cockpit Remy toyed with a cigarette, twirling it in his fingers. When Kurt reappeared he asked, "How long till we land homme?"

Kurt looked at the HU display. "About forty five minutes."

Remy thought about that for a moment then asked, "Is there smoking on dis flight?"

"I…I don't know actually." He was surprised at his own ignorance. He stayed on the ship on and off for about a third of his time. The rest he was on assignment. He always considered it Anna's home and never had occasion to ask or to answer such questions.

Anna entered after her few minutes of soul searching and answered it for the both of them.

"Put yah smokes away. I don't have the filters for it." She said as she passed him on the way to her seat, all business once again. Kurt and Remy exchanged a look and a shrug.

Fifteen minutes later Anna pinged Song Xiu's tower and got her flight path. There was another thirty minutes of circling before they were allowed to descend and taxi into an open parking spot and no sooner was the gangway down than Remy was at the end of it gratefully puffing away. He sat, elbows on knees, lost in the pleasure of one of his favorite addictions.

She sat herself down next to him and caught one of his inscrutable glances. "So what's the plan Cajun?" She asked him with some anxiety.

He took another long drag and examined the third of a cigarette remaining. "We go have a look at Bastion's warehouse. He might still have it."

"He's got a warehouse?"

"Well…in a manner of speakin'. He's no joke, chere. He does brisk business for a criminal. And Sinny's only worse."

"Keepin' all that contraband has gotta be dangerous as hell."

"Depends who's got y' back." He winked at her and she looked away.

"So when do we leave?" She asked.

He smiled and gazed at his cigarette again. "You ain't leavin' chere."

"What?" She was tense in an instant, unreasonably so.

"I'll go have a look. It's what you gonna pay me for isn'it. If I need you, I'll call you." He took another drag. "That reminds me…I should get your number."

She felt confused. Of course he would go alone. What could they possibly do for him? Of course he needed her number. Why hadn't they done this before? Why hadn't he asked for payment yet?

She pulled out her phone and passed it to him and he did the same for her. When at last he walked off of the tarmac and onto the train platform to take him into town her thoughts reversed. _I'm good with a gun! _She thought to yell after him, but didn't. No doubt she would only sound more foolish. Instead she turned and walked back into the ship.

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	7. Chapter 7

Remy got off the tram in an old and exhausted part of the city, beaten down by use the way a man's body was beaten down by decades of labor. For a brief time, in the not too distant past, he had worked these streets and he remembered Bastion and his operation well. He remembered Sinister even better. Sometimes he still dreamed about it, and from those dreams he would wake screaming and covered in a sheen of sweat. He pushed the thoughts aside.

Bastion tended to keep his goods in a handful of rented storage facilities. Anything particularly fine he would keep in his home but this was too big for that. The security at these places was reasonable for what they were but no match for him. He hoped against all odds that the adamantium had not been moved yet.

The first storage unit was completely empty but for a few boxes of cloths. It worried him that Bastion might have changed up his MO in the past few months, but the second had drums full of a white powder that smelled of naphthalene. No doubt an ingredient for some synthetic intoxicant yet to be produced. It would be the third. He could feel it in his bones. The way he felt when he was holding pocket aces…all tingly under the skin. And that feeling was _almost _never wrong.

The lock on the third unit clicked open with minimal effort and he slid his picks out. As gently as he could he lifted the corrugated aluminum door a few feet and slipped inside. It stank…like someone had lived in it and never cleaned out the toilet. With his flashlight still in his teeth he scanned the room and saw a canvas covering something big and square. Jackpot. He pulled the heavy fabric off with a sharp _sshhhick_, but saw no bars of rare earth. Only blue eyes shining and terrified staring back at him through dirty grey wisps of hair, locked in a cage meant for circus animals or racing dogs or something. There was a body in there with her, obviously dead, and a bucket filled with excrement.

He should have felt rage, or sadness, or deep pity, but he felt what he felt all those years ago in Izmar…Empty and perhaps cold…but that wasn't the right word. The right word was cool, or disconnected, or drifting…like he was floating in the middle of an ocean, long after the panic of being lost at sea had past, slowly succumbing to madness at the hands of insensible fate. _Of course…of course the world is a shit hole - full of senseless misery. Of course there are little girls starving to death in storage units…you p'tit are one of many. Why would god make the world any other way? _He and his invisible god had had many such one sided arguments until he had given up on understanding.

It was without thought that he picked the lock of the cage. There was no occasion for talk and in any case, the girl, starved as she was, and frightened past words, could not speak, so she mutely followed him out of the unit, out of the loading area, and out into the city. She was weak and shivering and above all conspicuous so he wrapped her in his coat and carried her for a mile, avoiding public transportation, taxis, and any eyes at all if he could, until he reached a midgrade motel near an overpass. He left her outside when he went in to pay for the room and she hid behind a bush as though the very night itself would reach out its arms and grab her. He paid with someone else's credit card, grabbed peanuts, an apple, and a bottle of water in the lobby and returned to her. When they were finally in the room he waited for her to finish greedily drinking before asking her name.

She answered, with a mouth full of apple, something that sounded like Aurora.

"How old are you, Aurora?"

She stopped chewing and stared dumbly at him. Her eyes drifted up and to the right as if the question itself were a riddle. He moved on.

"If I leave you here for a few hours will you stay put?"

She nodded vigorously.

"Alright then…I'm gonna run you a bath p'tit. You can get in it after I leave." She nodded again and, though he lacked confidence in the fidelity of her assurances, he left her a few moments later to search the remaining storage units before the sky began to grow light.

The rest of the night he worked like an automaton, methodical and unfeeling, fueled by something unknown into this furious frenzy of effort and somewhere in the back of his mind he knew it was making him reckless. The fourth locker he thought to try was bare and he began to worry that he would fail this particular assignment. At the fifth facility however he could see a moving truck backed up to unit and three or four men loading something. He moved in closed, ducking behind stacked steel drums and crates. The men were obviously Bastion's. He recognized one of them and knew he would be recognized in turn. Getting in close he could tell it was the adamantium they were moving and once it was all loaded in this truck it would never be seen again.

He waited. The stuff was so heavy they could only move it two bars at a time and he was grateful for the delay. Thank god they didn't have a pallet jack, he thought, and almost allowed himself to be entertained for a moment. At last all three backs were turned and the driver sat preoccupied in the cab. He slunk underneath the truck and nestled himself in the metal frame.

His muscles ached as he perched unnaturally for what seemed like hours, but then he heard the intonation of goodby's and thank you's and the footfalls of a single man walking to the passenger side of the cab. He would have to be fast. It would have to be within a few blocks of this place…or he could follow them all the way to their base. He wasn't sure and it made him antsy. This was not the way he liked to do business. He liked to be sure of things. He liked his jobs well researched and well executed. He liked plans and backup plans and backup backup plans. He had to admit to himself that he accepted this job because of the pretty pilot and his own curiosity. He cursed himself for being an insufferable fool for beautiful women. Still, he would not be the best thief in the known universe, he flattered himself, if he couldn't improvise.

The truck lumbered down a few grey blocks of the city and he decided to wait. After a few minutes it slowed and pulled into a fast food restaurant and the passenger got out and went inside. The hiss of the hydraulic break sounded.

_Now or never_

He dropped and quietly rolled out from under the chassis of the truck. Approaching in the mirror's blind spot he simply opened the door and pulled the driver down by his hair, wrapping an arm around his neck.

"What the fuuuu…" was all the man could get out before he was bent sideways and backwards in a chokehold. His arms flailed and reached for the buckle of the seat belt or for the horn but all he could get to was the edge of the door. He tried to slam it into his unknown assailant but his angle was poor and his strength failing, he changed tactics, trying instead to claw out his attacker's eyes, but again the angle wasn't quite right. He managed to scratch his face and get a fistful of hair but little more before everything started to go dark.

Remy thought about relaxing his grip for an instant just to ask him whom he worked for. Just in case the poor sod uttered some other name besides Nathanial Essex. But he persisted, his fear overwhelming his curiosity. The man passed into unconsciousness and when he woke five minutes later in the filthy ditch next to the road, his partner roughly nudging him with his toe, a bag of burgers and fries dropped carelessly to one side, the truck was nowhere in sight.

Remy drove a few blocks until he found another truck that carried the appropriate registration. He took a moment to switch the plates on his truck, tucking the original plate into the glove compartment, and was on his way again, back to the motel. It was a risky move given the security cameras in the motel parking lot but by the time Bastion or whomever had time to really start looking or him he planned on being deep underground again.

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	8. Chapter 8

The girl, who had lain curled in a ball atop the cheap floral-print comforter, started and looked at him when he entered the room. He noted that her hair wasn't grey any longer; it was pearly white now that it was clean and her blue eyes were particularly noteworthy set in her nut-brown face. She looked to be about 5 years old, maybe 6.

"Up p'tit. We gotta go."

Again she obeyed without a sound and he appreciated it given the state of his nerves.

They were within a hairs breadth of being done with this job but still he couldn't relax. Not until they were back in the ship and underway. It was so hard to sneak up on someone in space. But on the ground, and he knew this to be true, you could kill a man in plain sight and no one might notice at all. Of all the things his estranged wife had taught him, this he remembered vividly, second only to how much pain a heart could feel and keep beating. This was why he sat with his back to the wall when he went out. It was why he looked behind him when he walked. As much as he loved to be on the ground, it was much safer in space.

He drove carefully through the city, the suburbs, past the agricultural zone, and into the airfield. He was on the access list as Anna had promised and the gate guard waved him through after a FOD check, a look inside the truck bed, and some cursory signatures. On the register he wrote "NICKLE, 4 TONNES" and the guard, unable to tell the difference, merely shrugged. He drove up to she ship bold as brass and honked the horn once, then again when there was no immediate response.

At last the loading ramp began to descend and Anna came skipping down with a ridiculous smile that made him double take. If he had been standing there at the end of the ramp he thought she might have jumped into his arms and kissed him. He smiled back at her and gave her an OK sign. As though suddenly remembering something she turned and ran back up the ramp only to return a moment later with the palate jack and a wry look on her face. She walked between the tines pushing it along then deftly spun it around when she got to the bottom.

He laughed aloud and turned the truck around backing the doors up to be unloaded. The loading ramp of the ship could be manually raised to meet the bed of the truck so they could pull the whole palate off at once.

"Well Cajun." She beamed. "Well done."

"We ain't done yet chere…I gotta dump this truck someplace."

"Just drive it into the bay, I'll dump it in Jura."

He pulled his head back. "I…I guess you could."

"Or I'll fly out to the Magnetar and drop it…It'll get sucked in."

"Huh." He thought about it for a second. All the vehicles entering the airfield were logged but no one tracked them to make sure they exited. "Alright…that would actually be…fine." He shook his head to clear it. "Look chere, I gotta tell you something." But she didn't hear him.

She grabed the jack handle and cranked the load up a few inches, then leaned backward slowly dragging the heavy palate up the ramp.

"Let me get dat."

"I can do it." She cut in quickly, almost defensively, between huffing breaths. He raised his hands in surrender but then bent down to add his weight to the palate frame pushing it up the slope. At the top she let go and shook her hands out. Remy walked around to stand next to her.

She looked up at him with her childlike smile, now threatening to become permanent. "Thank you." She breathed, still panting from exertion. She seemed familiar to him in that moment and on an impulse he raised his hands to caress her elbow with his thumb but stopped short, a split second gesture, both awkward and fleeting. "Anytime, chere." He half whispered. She looked down, turned to the side, cleared her throat. He took the cue and backed up a foot or two.

The moment of intimacy left both of them uncomfortable and he sought to dispel it by putting some distance between them.

"Listen…'bout payin' me…"

"Of course…I'm so sorry." She seemed grateful or the distraction and quickly fumbled around in her jacket for her phone to transfer the funds to him. "How much?"

"Non, wait." He ran his fingers through his hair looking nervous for the first time since she'd known him. "Look chere, what I need right now is a place to stay dat's…ahem…out of de way."

She stared at him dumbly, so he made it explicit.

"I wanna board on y' ship fo' a while…as payment."

Her silent stare dragged on.

"And I have a friend I gotta bring wit' me."

"A friend?" She repeated.

"Yeah…she's in de truck."

"Oh…_she_ is?" Her head ducked around him to look into the truck. "I don't see anyone."

He spun around to look but he saw what she did not, a lock of silvery hair peeking above the dash. "She's in there." He said and walked down to the truck to retrieve her. He opened the passenger door and Aurora hopped out like a little bird, all bones and ragged wisps of clothing.

"Anna, dis Aurora. She gon' join de crew fo' a bit if dat's alright wit de captain." He looked at the girl and winked then looked back at Anna for the approval he knew she would have to give.

"How long?" Anna asked matter-of-factly still holding her phone at the ready and looking at the girl with intense concern and trepidation.

He snorted. "Don' worry chere…not too long." And he began to walk past her signaling for the girl to follow. _Never too long._

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	9. Chapter 9

TL;DR – Anna unnecessarily freaks out about Rems and Rora on the ship then Kurt and Remy bro down over some cigarettes and bible verses. Please R&R.

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Kurt heard the tap tap tap of little feet skittering across the bay and leaned over the railing to see Etienne and the girl walking toward the stairs. He passed a long curious look to Anna who stared helplessly back at him. When the pair reached the top Remy made introductions gesturing to Kurt.

"Rora dis Kurt…he's a real bad-ass-muther-fucker so you do what he say." Kurt winced at the language but set his qualms and questions aside and played along, kneeling down and offering his hand to the little girl. "Hello liebchen."

She offered back a sphinx-like smile that he found endearing if not a little strange.

"Maybe you get her some blankets or somet'ing and put her in a room?"

"Ahh…" He looked again to Anna who was now half way up the stairs on her way to the cockpit. She nodded at him with a tight smile. "Alright little one. Follow me." He said.

Anna passed them, dumbfounded, on her way to the cockpit and Remy followed right behind her. She plopped down in her seat and leaned her face into one hand. She heard, rather than saw, him sit in the seat next to her.

"Etienne…I don't know if you can stay." She spit out quickly.

"Oh…dat's fine…I can take my adamantium and be on my way." He said, admiring the whites of his fingernails.

She didn't take the threat seriously and passed him a look that said as much.

"Look…you just…my...boss…can't find you here…ok?"

"Was it really dat hard to spit out all dem words." He asked sarcastically.

"I'm serious."

"Your boss spend a lot o' time on dis ship?"

"No but she might have a look around…know what I mean?"

"I can hide from y' boss." He said, utterly unconcerned.

"And the girl?"

"She's small…we put her in a closet or somet'ing."

She laughed involuntarily. "Alright…" She kneaded her forehead with her left hand, then ran her palm over the crown of her head, pulling her white forelocks back and letting them fall again around her face. "Alright, this is what we'll do." He leaned in with exaggerated interest. "If anyone asks you…you're paying passengers on your way to St. Marge. She'll be ok with that. The little girl is your…niece…or something."

"Your boss really got you under her thumb, huh."

She couldn't deny the truth of his statement and grimaced slightly. "You don't understand."

"Oh, I have an idea."

If there was anything in the world she didn't want to talk about it was her relationship with Raven. She made an obvious attempt at changing the subject.

"We'll be in Jura in 78 hours by the way."

He picked up on her cue and let himself be led into a little careless banter.

"You not gonna use a star gate?" He asked her, not really caring one way or the other.

"A wha…you mean a jump gate?"

"Half a dozen o' one, six o' de other."

"Ah…no…too expensive unless its an emergency. Who calls them star gates?"

"Everyone."

They bantered on for another twenty minutes or so until he started to feel the pull of sleep, the night's adrenaline having finally worn off.

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He slept like the dead and in the morning he was itching for a cigarette so hard it hurt to even think of the next 70 hours. Instinctively he looked for Kurt.

Kurt was reading his bible in the alcove when Remy ambled in and stood by the chair across from him.

"Mind if I join you?"

"Not at all. Sleep well?"

"Yeah…just a hell of a night last night."

"Ja…I can imagine."

"Thanks for takin' on de girl by the way."

Kurt waived his hand in the air, "It was up to Anna…and besides…'Inasmuch as you have done anything for the least of my brethren, even the very least of these, so have you done for me'."

Remy seemed to think about that for a moment with a far away expression, though eventually his mind wandered more than wondered. At length he sat and looked out the window at the pink glow of ionized hydrogen adorning the horsehead nebula. From this angle it looked more like a jellyfish, he mused.

Kurt returned to his scriptures and they sat thusly, in perfect silence for a moment.

Then, out of the blue Remy spoke again. "So there's no where…absolutely no where on dis ship…where I can have a smoke?"

Kurt set his bible thoughtfully in his lap and looked at him.

"Well…and he looked up as he thought. "There is emergency ventilation in the bay for fires."

"Won't that just suffocate us?"

"Not if we override the intake shutoff."

"Won't that suffocate everyone on the ship?"

"Not if it is only a little bit, just for a few minutes. And we can make more air from the septic system."

"I don't think I wanna breathe that air, no offence homme."

Kurt laughed, closed his bible, and stood up.

"Lets give it a try."

"Wait…you're sure." He asked seriously, "I don't wanna get dat sister o' yours after my ass."

Kurt laughed lightheartedly. "Don't worry…I'll protect you."

Remy grinned. "Well alright den."

Ten minutes later, sitting on the catwalk directly below an exhaust intake the two men sat a few feet away from each other. Kurt dangled both feet over the edge and looked down through his knees to the floor below. Remy let one leg hang over the side and bent the other knee to rest his locked elbow on when he wasn't inhaling on his cigarette.

"So you a bible readin' man?"

"Ja."

"Even in dis fucked up world of spaceships and gene therapy and all dat jazz…"

"Ja."

"You t'ink all dem prophecies can be true now dat dere's only a handful of folk on de earth? Now dat people live in de sky?"

"Well…prophecies are…metaphorical. They cannot be relied upon to be perfect."

"Ain't dat a fact." Remy murmured and took a long drag of his cigarette. It was the second time Kurt had said something that hit close to home in less than a quarter hour. Out of some masochistic curiosity he tested his luck. "Read me somet'ing outta your book…just open to a page…I wanna see what we get."

Kurt complied, flopping the heavy leather volume closed and letting the onion skin pages fall open again in his hand. "Come, let us reason together, saith the Lord. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are crimson I shall make them white as wool."

Remy leaned his had back against an I-beam and snorted. Then laughed. Then laughed harder.

"What?" Kurt asked, genuinely curious.

"I just…Nuthin'…Not even God can undo what's been done. Even if he wanted to."

Kurt was quiet for a moment, pondering the truth of the statement.

"But forgiveness isn't about undoing…" He began.

"I'm Catholic too…or I was…just so you know." Remy interrupted.

"Oh…I didn't know."

"I know all the prayers and all the verses." He dreamily arched his hand 180 degrees to his mouth and sucked on his cigarette then flicked a nub of ashes down into the bay.

"So what happened?"

"Hmm?" he looked confused and concerned at the question.

"How did you loose your faith."

"Oh dat?" He took another drag. "I dunno, life got too complicated I guess."

Kurt sensed that a religious conversation would not be to his taste and felt at a loss for words. Etienne didn't seem like much of a man to talk about himself either. The silence proceeded awkwardly for a few beats then Remy picked it up again, changing the subject.

"So what do you do on dis ship? You got dat rifle on you most o' de time, but you go and do all dis mechanical bullshit wit de vents."

"Anna and I have had to learn a lot of tricks to run this ship by ourselves."

"It always just de two of you?"

"Nein, most of the time it's just her."

"Why…where do you get off to."

"I have…assignments."

Remy gave him a crooked smile. "Assignments huh?"

"Ja."

He didn't press the point. "So on this ship you just haul and smuggle a little bit?"

"No smuggling."

"No smuggling? …or maybe just a little smuggling?" He pinched the air with his thumb and forefinger and squinted through the little gap he made.

"No."

"So what was that adamantium about?" He saw the look on Kurt's face and changed direction. "You know what…never mind. I don' wanna talk about business either." He turned to look at Kurt for the first time since their conversation started. "What's the deal wit' your sister. She seems real…weird."

"What do you mean?"

"Sometimes she's so stern and professional: a proper little businesswoman. Sometimes she seems kinda innocent like a little girl. Other times she seems…nervous. I can't figure it out."

"Well…She is very good at what she does…"

"Flying?"

"Yes…and she is a good mechanic and a good at managing all the paperwork with all of the deliveries and such, but she doesn't get out much. She and mother have issues. There are a few reasons I could see. But I'm used to her and she doesn't seem strange to me."

"Oh…how would you describe her?"

"She's…I don't know. She's Anna."

He grunted and thought about that. "What does she do when she ain't workin?"

"She reads a lot. She spends a lot of time on the net. She runs on the treadmill. Other than that…"

"Seems like a lot of fun."

Kurt shrugged. "Better than me and my bible probably."

Remy laughed. "You're alright homme. You know dat." And he pointed at him with the two fingers holding his cigarette. "I like you an' your bible jus' fine." Then took another drag and extinguished the butt on his heel as before.

The two men stood and ambled back into the ship. Despite all the warnings he repeated to himself, Kurt couldn't help liking the thief, and that in itself, he suspected, made him all the more dangerous.

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	10. Chapter 10

The remaining two days and some odd hours Rora spent either in the kitchen, if she was hungry, or the lounge if she was anything else. The stars made her feel peaceful. The immense clouds of the nebulae enthralled her, distracted her, from strange dreams…strange memories. Memories that stretched back a long lifetime and all flowed into a child's nightmare of terrifying shadows and hushed menacing whispers. When she grew tired she would fetch the blanket from her room and curl up with it on the couch looking out at space.

She followed the thief around sometimes, occasionally without him knowing it, and he would sneak about when the grownups weren't looking, peeking his head into storage compartments and little pockets of space hidden away on the ship, behind an air vent or behind an access panel. If he knew she was there he would look at her and put an index finger to his lips and wink. He found a door in the back of the engine room he couldn't open and became a little obsessed with it, but the fascination seemed to pass as they closed on Jura.

She followed the girl-pilot as well, sitting with her in the cockpit for long hours. She liked it in the cockpit for the same reason she liked the lounge - the view. But here there was a sense of self-determination because she was moving forward through space, not simply watching it pass by. That seemed important; a denial of predestination that they both secretly loved.

The pilot, for her part, was friendly with her but unnerved by her otherworldly manner. She could sense it. The confusion. The discomfort. It was because she spoke little and when she did it was with striking formality and breadth of vocabulary. Anna learned quickly to speak to her as an adult, but even then there was something distant about her. Rora felt it herself - a sense of being removed - as though all of life's lessons were already inside her and she wasn't learning about the world so much as remembering it.

Their first real conversation was about cloths…because she wore rags. The pilot gave her some of her own but they were too big. One shirt was so long they put a belt around it to make a dress. Once in Jura Anna took her shopping. She bought her little sandals and black leggings and long flowing blouses.

Their second conversation was about flying. A subject that brought them instantly together like the harmony and melody of a song.

"Do you want to try holding the controls?"…"Here, this throttle will speed us up or slow us down"…"Let me show you how to pull up the HUD." And so on. As with shopping Anna seemed delighted with the act of teaching, of having a protégé, or perhaps simply of having a companion.

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A week or so later, at breakfast, which fell some time between when Kurt made coffee and when Anna got up to drink it. Remy noticed Rora walking barefoot down in the bay.

"Don't y' feet hurt, girl?" he called down to her.

She looked up at him and then down again to ascend the stairs. Remy winced watching her pad along the grated floor.

"The shoes are too small." She said, walking up to him.

He poured himself some coffee and sat down at the table. "Already?…din' Anna jus' buy dem?"

"Yes." The girl looked distressed.

"Eh…kids grow fast…neh? She get you new ones next time we stop."

"I don't want to impose upon Anna's finances again."

"I buy y' some."

"I don't want to impose upon anyone."

"Well…dat's what kids do…don' gotta feel bad about it." He took a sip.

"I'm not a…" Her statement tapered off is a frustrated sigh.

"Not a what?"

"…a kid."

He laughed…"Yeah you're a big girl an all dat."

"Etienne…look at me…" And she drew close. They were of the same height now that he was sitting. He looked at her, serious this time. She quaked imperceptibly, like an aspen grove in the almost still air. "Someone did something to me." She whispered. Desperate confusion shrouding her face and voice. Here was the conversation he knew might come but that he would not begin, that no one could but she. He looked at her with concern and penetrating focus. Swallowed once.

"What did dey do to you p'tit?" he asked in a resigned, sad voice.

Her mouth opened but at first nothing came out. She looked at her hands, tiny delicate hands, clenched them into fists, released them. "I have memories that are older than this body." She continued to look at her hands, entranced. "And I am afraid of something…something that's looking for me…" Remy stared at her, brow furrowed, coffee suspended in midair.

"What are you two conspirin' about?" Anna said as she sauntered into the kitchen. It was enough to make Remy jerk a little bit and spill some coffee on his lap.

"Nuthin' chere…just wonderin what I'm gonna cook y' for dinner when we get to Avalon."

"Oh we're going out to eat when we get to Avalon my friends. Make no mistake about that."

"Yeah, you gonna show us around town?" He was trying to make conversation to distract himself from his own discomfort and it came out trite.

She shrugged. "Sure." And poured herself some coffee.

When he looked back at Aurora she had pulled away a foot or so. Her crisis of confidence had passed and she was once again the creature he knew; serene and distant. She did not look at him, only turned and went to the pantry to rummage for some breakfast. As much as he prided himself on letting things lie - As far as he had gotten in life by not asking questions, he knew he would have to talk to her about this, if only because someone looking for Rora was also looking for him.

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Please R&R...to my lovely anon reviewers...'lovely smile' and 'me voila'...Thank you.


	11. Chapter 11

This chapter is a little extra profane.

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The bazar in Avalon lived up to its name. There were foods there of every variety that an urban consumer of monocultured crops would never be able to identify. Anna and Kurt had been there before but even Remy was a little awed. There were carnival rides and games as well, fortunetellers, street performers, musicians, dancers, fire-eaters, pickpockets…oh the pickpockets. Remy watched them work with a deep pang of nostalgia. He saw Rora and Kurt pass by with a huge stuffed giraffe that Kurt had won for her at a shooting game, and as they did Rora snaked out her hand into a passing mans pocket and pulled out a thin leather wallet. Remy's head tilted unconsciously and he smiled. Was thieving how she ended up in that cage? Somehow he doubted it but the girl just kept getting more and more interesting.

He spied Anna about to have her fortune told in a nearby booth and stole up behind her.

"I can read your palm better than any o' these fake gypsies chere."

She jumped when she heard his voice.

"Holy Jesus Cajun, you snuck up on me."

"One o' my many gifts."

"I'm sure." She began to turn around.

"So how much are you gonna pay dis woman to lie to you."

_More than I pay you to, _she wanted to kick back acidy but she truly didn't believe he had ever lied to her, not overtly. It was just a sense she got from him, whenever he showed off his silver tongue, that lying was one of his _gifts._

"20 credits."

"I bet you she skims yo' card and cleans out y' account."

"You know Etienne…not everyone is a thief."

"No…not _everyone."_

"Fine then…read my palm." And she thrust her hand out toward him. He smiled, the first battle won.

"How about we sit down somewhere. Fortune tellin' is tiring business."

Ten minutes later they were at a cider stall drinking glorified pear juice at 11% with the lights of paper lanterns floating above their heads like fireflies. She held out her hand for him and he cupped it in his own then took his index finger and ran it slowly over the longest line of her palm. Was this the lifeline he wondered? It was the only thing he knew about palm reading, there was a lifeline somewhere.

"Well lets see…I already know y' work for y' mere and y' don' like it one bit. But y' palm tells me y' don't wana quit cuz y' scared o' bein' on y' own." He looked up at her to see her proud and put-off reaction but to his surprise she seemed to think about it, absorb it and consider it in a way that made him think she had mulled this idea over before. He continued brazenly, trying to get under her armor. "Are y' lonely on dat ship when Kurt's not around or do you have…other company?"

She didn't bite.

"You tell me Cajun…you're the one doin' the readin'." She sounded calm, not put off in the slightest. And…she always fell back into her accent around him. Mama would not approve.

A pack of giggling children ran past and someone probably lost their spending money when they did he distantly thought. There was a general noisiness to this place that was pleasant in the same way the chiming of a casino was pleasant.

He leaned in and casually stroked her palm, not even pretending to follow the lines of her skin, not doing anything but looking at her. He dragged three fingernails lightly from the heel of her palm all the way to her fingertips. She saw it, felt it, and shivered instead of tensing or pulling away - which she should have. Her mind ordered her to, but she couldn't. Each long, slow stroke of his fingers made her sink into his eyes the tiniest bit more.

He spoke again; his face was close to her now. "I don't t'ink a femme dat looks like you is lonely for very long." He whispered.

Some shade of sadness crept across her face. _He got it wrong__. _She looked in his eyes, smiled slowly, beautifully, and whispered back to him in her southern drawl, "Cajun, I can't believe how good yah are at bullshittin'."

He flashed the slightest frown then returned to his default half smile.

"At least it was free." He quipped back at her.

Slowly and gently she pulled her hand away from his though her body seemed to resist her.

"It's late. I'm gonna head back to the ship." She paused briefly to text Kurt then looked back up at him. "You boys don't have too much fun tonight…and don't keep the girl out too late." She stood up and began to walk off still working on her drink.

He was about to complain, to remind her that it was only the 20th hour on a 30 hour planet, but he heard something; a noise a little off key…a little louder than the rest of the crowd. Four syllables that didn't belong.

"I t'ink I turn in too, neh?"

She shot him a wary glance but he ignored it and fell in along side her. They walked silently for a few yards then he heard it again.

His name.

"Remy! Remy LeBeau!"

It was Victor's voice.

The name meant nothing to Anna, though he was sure she heard it. They continued casually strolling toward the ship. His mind scrambled. _Disappear into the crowd? Hide? Turn and fight? Draw her into it?_

Victor pulled along side Anna so that she was between the two of them. A maneuver Remy knew was intended to piss him off.

_So that's how it's gonna be._

"Hey pretty lady, who's your boyfriend?"

Anna gave him the most cursory of glances, enough to see his height and burl, his cruel smile adorned by sharply filed incisors, his military grey t-shirt, the lattice work of tattoos on his forearms, the eight pointed star. She made absolutely no reply.

"I _said..._who's your boyfriend."

By harassing the woman he was baiting the man. He would either fight or look foolish in front of what Victor assumed was an imminent conquest. But Remy didn't move and Anna looked at him quizzically, trying to put pieces together.

Remy could feel the heat rising in his blood but he fought to look calm and unconcerned. He suddenly grabbed Anna's wrist and jerked her behind him with such force she fell to the ground clutching her cider.

Victor laughed.

"You're comin' with me LeBeau. Say goodnight to your lady friend."

"Fuck you Sabre." He bit out out praying to god he didn't have backup."

"You really wanna fight me in front of all these people? You think you'd win?"

They circled each other a few feet apart in the patch of dirt that had opened for them. A handful of people stopped to watch but a fistfight wasn't enough of a novelty here to draw a real audience.

Remy reached in his coat and Victor charged. _Sshhink. _The staff extended just as he ducked out of the way. Victor grabbed the edge of his coat as he passed and Remy was forced to shed it. Victor whipped it aside and spit.

"You know guns kill people faster than shiny fuckin' sticks. But you never were that smart ya coon-ass little shit."

Anna stood up from her dusty seat and watched the circling men. Sabre's back was to her. He was talking. What an idiot.

She lifted her arm and swung her bottle into the back of his head but it didn't shatter, just bounced off. She was a little disappointed and a little bit scared. He turned to her snarling up at her from a half crouch that put them eye to eye and in that moment of confusion, the split second before he was going to backhand her back onto her ass, she stepped forward and drove her forehead into his nose. He howled and closed his eyes so that everything was already dark when the staff made contact with his skull.

His body crumbled in a heavy pile but it was a small and fleeting victory. Victor's compatriots were filtering through the crowd. They were easy to spot once you knew what to look for. The grey and dark blue paraphernalia. The dog tags. The dark patch with the white star on it. The emblems of Chirman Nur's favorite security firm – Dark Star. The Dogs of War, Raven called them or sometimes The Horsemen. They were the ones that had cleared out Izmar. They were the ones that enforced Nur's brutal regime, that had pushed her so far underground she didn't even know what she was doing with her life. But really Raven had done that…hadn't she? Or had she done it to herself…a crime of omission.

She looked up and made eye contact with one of the contractors…he pointed at her and said something over his shoulder then began trotting in her direction.

"C'mon!" She hissed at the thief. She grabbed his coat for him and grasped his hand like they were children running away from a monster. He didn't hesitate and released her hand almost immediately so they could sprint.

She looked back only once to see a couple of random grey-shirts turning the corner a hundred yards behind them, but they were already on the dirt landing strip and she could see Kurt and Rora walking onto the ship.

"Get in! Get in!" She yelled to them. A few moments later she and Remy came barreling up the ramp. Rora in true Rora fashion already had the engine spun up and the ramp closed right behind them. Anna tore up to the cockpit and fired up the stabilizing burners, clouding up the air, covering the ship's name and ID number. A few hopeless bullets and plasma bursts bounced of the hull or were absorbed. Even the tempered glass of the windows wouldn't have noticed, but the expanding cloud of dust made shooting utterly pointless.

She tilted the ship up and burned the engine as hard as it was willing, taking off at near vertical. The gravity of the planet and the artificial gravity vied for dominance and Remy and Kurt found themselves clutching at the cargo netting behind their seats to keep from sliding out the door of the cockpit. Alarms started sounding. Over-G alarms and pressure alarms and heat alarms but still she persisted, because if there were a bunch of contractors hanging around Avalon it meant they were on shore leave (hopefully nothing more) and if they were on shore leave it meant there was a ship nearby.

Rogue would need some attention after this she thought, but she didn't want to risk heading back to Jura right away, on the off chance she might be followed.

At last they hit orbit and she punched in a flight path for Madripoor. Weird, out-of-the-way Madripoor, far from civilization but with enough shipping traffic that nothing would seem amiss if an empty cargo ship happened to stumble along looking for a haul.

She looked over her shoulder at the thief still gripping the netting.

"How does Madripoor sound to you…_Remy?"_

* * *

Dark Star is my play on Black Water...the favorite security firm that the US uses. They have since "disbanded" but really just operate under different names.


	12. Chapter 12

He needed to think. And he needed a smoke.

While Anna was still busy at the controls, before she had time to turn her attention to him again, he got up and went to his smoking roost in the bay. He adjusted the ventilation as he had been shown and went to the metal perch below which a pile of ash was starting to accumulate. He tore through one cigarette in a bare minute and lit another one right behind it.

It wasn't long before he heard the hollow clanking of Anna's footfalls approaching…he could tell just from the rhythm of her gait, quick and light and oh-so uptight. She strode up and sat next to him without ceremony, holding out her hand for his cigarette. He took one more long drag and handed it to her imagining the coughing fit that would follow but she surprised him, inhaling on it lightly but not inexpertly, then handing it back.

"Why is Dark Star after you?" She asked, straight to the point.

He inhaled deeply and paused, holding the smoke in his lungs for a few seconds, then let it all out in a gust.

"Chere, just let me off in Madripoor and you won't ever have t' worry about it."

She was quiet for a beat or two, held out her hand for the cigarette again, sucked on it, handed it back.

"I might…if they ID us."

"Not even then. Just tell them I was a paying passenger like you were planin' on telling y' mere."

Anna laughed a soft breathless laugh, rubbed her hands up and down her thighs.

"No…I can't do that. Aside from the fact that I assaulted one of them…I can't have them search this ship."

He didn't respond, caught up in his own worry.

"Is there a bounty on you?" She asked, toying with a long string on the cuff of her blouse.

"Probably." _Yes._

She crossed her ankles and swung her feet back and forth a little bit, a habit of thought. _He could disappear in Madripoor. God knows it was the place for someone like him to disappear._

She sensed an impasse and it needled at her. Her own instincts told her to let it go but she jumped to the best conclusion she could come up with and let the words escape her lips before she had time to hold them back.

"You're a deserter." She whispered. "You had a contract with Dark Star and you took off." She said it like it was a fact and he was silent when she looked up at him to see his half lidded eyes looking down at her, assessing.

"Somethin' like that." He said at last then took another drag.

"And that guy…Sabre…was looking to get a pat on the back by brining you in?"

He shrugged.

She swallowed. "What did they call you…when you were in uniform."

"What do you mean?"

"Your call sign."

He chuckled and she was relieved by it. "Not everyone gets a call sign chere."

"But you did…didn't you." Because people that could do the kind of work that Etie…that Remy did…were not ordinary.

He nodded, but didn't answer.

She exhaled, a little ashamed that she had pried, then she slapped her hands on her knees signaling the end of their conversation and began to stand up. "Well don't disappear as soon as we land Cajun." She said. "I might need your help with one last thing before you ride off into the sunset."

"Oh yeah, what's that?"

"Stealin' something…of course." And she winked at him with all the brassy charm of a ten piece band…and he smiled.

* * *

New Madripoor had an old-world feel to it. Much like the original city it was named after, it was built on an island and took up nearly all of it. It was a city of sprawling slums and soaring palaces. The smell and sound of the ocean pervaded everything especially during the hot summer when the stagnant air filled up with the scents of the many fishing boats; from tiny sail boats to industrial trawlers. Seagulls and rats were everywhere.

The planet that housed it, called N'Gari by the inhabitants but known by a combination of numbers and letters on most star charts, was almost entirely water but for several groups of islands scattered over its surface, each one crowned with a dead or dying volcanic peak. But for all this its defining feature was its division from the Union. It, and the other planets it shared a system with, had never been pulled into the fold of worlds and colonies that Nur and the Cabinet presided over. The reasons were unclear and perhaps political, but most assumed it was because of the immense wealth that resided here as well as an array of advanced technologies unique to Madripoor's military. The culture here was different, wilder and freer at the same time.

Kurt stepped off the ship with his rifle still on his back, something he dared not do in a Union city. He and Rora walked out onto a long quay that seemed to stretch on for miles. It bobbed and twisted under their feet. Fishermen offered to sell to them as they passed but Kurt demurred with a smile and a raised palm. From a distance he looked like a saint blessing the net fulls of fish.

When they reached the end they sat down and looked out over the ocean. It was cloudy and Kurt let out a disappointed sigh.

"You know…there's an island right…there." And he pointed his finger precisely, with one eye shut…like he was aiming. "You can't quite see it through the clouds."

"What makes you think of it just now." Asked Rora.

"I don't know…it looks pretty when you can see it in shadow with the sunset behind it. Once Anna claimed she could swim to it."

Rora imagined it, the black silhouette of a volcano with all the colors of evening to backlight it and as she did a light breeze sprang up and lifted her hair out of her face. The heavy clouds began to move and the boats clattered gently against one another. It blew away the smell of fish and seaweed, replacing it with the pure smell of saltwater, and it blew away the thick clots of cloud until thin slanted rays of light broke through to spotlight patches of blue on the surface of the choppy water.

"Huh." Said Kurt. "This feels nice. I wonder if there's gonna be a storm?"

Dreamily Rora leant her head against a wooden pile.

"No, there will be no Storm." She murmured.

* * *

"This is it." Anna said slapping her hand on a dark grey metal square barely delineated from the rest of the engine room wall covered in lights and cannon plugs and various i/o ports. She grabbed two small metal handles on either side of the box and pulled with enough force that she had to brace herself against the wall with her leg and he could see the slender muscles in her neck straining. When it disengaged she released it and stumbled back a few feet, then rubbed her hands together and looked at him self-consciously. "It's a lot easier goin' in." She said. Then she hoisted it out, bracing it on her knee, and set it on its face so that it rested on the flats of the two handles. "Here's the IFF port." She said pointing to an uncovered cannon plug on the back. "If it doesn't say IFF on the back somewhere don't take it."

"What if it ain't in Union?"

"Wha…everything's in Union speak. I doubt there's a ship here that wasn't manufactured in a Union space port."

"Dis Madripoor…y' never know."

She thought about it for a minute, decided it was unlikely if not impossible.

"Well just…don't take it if you don't see the IFF port. Besides, the ship I pointed out to you should be similar to Rogue."

He nodded and she bent to pick up the metal box but it was heavy and awkward. He offered to help and she let him lift the end of it back into its slot, then she slid it back onto its connectors with a strong and sudden push. It clicked, a soft, gentle, and strangely satisfying sound inconsistent with her rough handling.

They were about to head out but Remy stopped at the door he had once tried unsuccessfully to break into. He had no doubt that he could defeat it but not without leaving some trace of his questing, and he liked it on the ship, he liked the people on the ship, so he had left off.

"Hey p'tit?" He nodded to the white, carbon fiber door.

"Yeah."

"What's in there?"

She answered without pause or anxiety, a fact that amazed him in retrospect.

"It's the engine."

* * *

Thanks as always to 'lovely smile' and 'me voila'

So...I left my outline in the dust a couple of chapters ago. I have to say I feel like the writing is better, but I'm a little nervous I may introduce inconsistencies or repeat myself. I can already tell the pacing has changed and I'm not sure how faithfully I'm representing Kurt. I've also noticed I'm better at writing fight scenes than flirty Romy stuff, which really surprised me. I'll, uh...work on that.

Please feel free to provide actual literary criticism. These are called Etudes because they're practice. I give myself a lot of leeway because of the limited amount of time I have to write but I'd still love to get better.

Thanks for reading and reviewing.

XOXO

-J


	13. Chapter 13

Within a few hours of landing Anna had found a contract, predictably hauling frozen fish to Station 12, and she went into business mode preparing for it. Flushing and replacing the water in the septic systems, clearing out space for the big styrofoam boxes, and filling out the customs forms in advance.

In the evening they all went to the Sovereign Hotel for dinner and drinks and a little gambling. Rora squirmed in her shoes which had once again grown tight and Remy, as promised, bought her a new expensive pair of leather sandals with black straps that wrapped around the ankle, not unaware that these were the third pair of shoes she'd gone through in the past few months. She grew fast, and though it was in the nature of children to grow quickly, her growth was particularly striking. He marveled that they had all denied the fact for so long, but seeing her everyday had blunted the force of her change. Only when he recalled the memory of her in rags tucked in his arms could he truly see how much she'd grown. She might have been five or six when he found her…now she looked to be eight or nine…or so he guessed. But then he doubted himself again. Adolescent girls came in a shocking variety and he didn't really know anything about them, and besides, she'd been starved back then. He let his concerns drift off and watched her excitedly scamper in and out of dressing rooms while he palmed some crystal jewelry just to pass the time.

Her cloths seemed small as well, so with characteristic generosity he bought her a few new outfits, a sleeveless red and gold tunic with jeans, a long-sleeved blouse of embroidered white linen with black leather pants, a long dress of pale pink silk like the inside of a seashell, all beautiful and pricey, but he liked watching her sway this way and that in the tall mirrors. He liked her childlike smile, the one he almost never saw. She looked like a wealthy man's daughter in her finery. No one would suspect she was a wandering orphan in the company of a thief, a smuggler, and whatever the fuck Kurt was. He felt a certain kinship with her and he longed to protect her, as he himself had not been.

After dinner Rora went home with Kurt, who had little taste for games of chance, and Remy took the opportunity to continue his lazy and thus far fruitless pursuit of the pilot. The two of them played black jack and a few dice games peculiar to Madripoor. They won a little, lost a little, and eventually ended up at one of the bars ringing the floor, listening to the upbeat chatter of the gamblers and the pentatonic hum of a string ensemble.

He asked her about the card he was supposed to steal and she told him it would let her to masquerade as another ship for a while…if she needed to, a precaution against Dark Star in the wake of their near miss. He asked her about her travels, her favorite cities, her most memorable jobs, but when she asked about him he always found a way to deflect her questions and before she knew it she was talking about herself again.

"Why is your life such a secret Remy?" She finally asked out of frustration.

"Because I'm a criminal." He answered matter-of-factly.

She rolled her eyes. "That doesn't matter."

"Oh yeah…I forgot. You a criminal too."

"I'm not a smuggler."

"Dat's right…keep sayin' it."

"Pffft…you don't know." And she waved her hand in the air a little sloppily. She noticed her increasing ataxia for the first time and furrowed her brow. "I think I drank too much. I should go back to the ship."

She got down from the stool and looked at him. "You comin'?"

"Non."

"But you're coming back tonight…right? Or should Ah just lock the ship up…actually…nevermind."

He chuckled at her. "You can lock up….I'm gonna stay in de hotel."

She nodded and turned to go but he stopped her.

"You could stay in the hotel too..."

"Yeah but Ah got a free bed on the ship, so…" She shrugged.

He stared at her with an almost smile and held her gaze even when he tilted his head back to take a sip of his drink.

She didn't get it.

So he said it.

"You got a free bed here, p'tit."

She blinked. Her mouth opened in a silent "Oh' and a blush flared on her cheeks. Charming, beautiful…innocent, as he remembered her in the Hellfire Club…but frozen like an animal caught in the beam of a floodlight.

He hopped off the barstool and lined up next to her with his arm bent, an invitation for her to take it. She accepted, slipping her hand into the crook of his elbow without a word, and walking with him all the way to the elevators. Her other hand came up to his arm as well so that she clung to him as if to let go would be to fall.

When they arrived in the room she lingered by the door like she didn't belong there. He walked to the French doors, opened them, stepped out, lit a cigarette. When he looked back at her she was still standing in the same place. He frowned.

"Wassa matter chere? C'mere."

Obediently she floated to him like a ghost, slowly walking the length of the ornate room, and the bewilderment on her face was disconcerting. He reached out a hand when she came close and tucked a white lock of hair behind her ear.

"I don't get it p'tit. You ain't afraid o' nuthin' on your ship. You're little miss in charge, and _I got this_, and _don't worry about it_. I take you outta der and you look like you gonna fall apart.

"I like it on my ship."

He snorted. "Guess so."

He took a drag of his cigarette and offered it to her. She inhaled on it gratefully, hoping it would calm her nerves…and he just kept _looking_ at her, but now instead of the hungry, wolfish stare she was used to there was only concern.

"You know chere…we don't haveta do anything." He said as he took the cigarette back from her.

"No…its ok…I wanna." She stammered out.

"Don' seem like it." His voice had a slight edge to it. She heard it and apologized.

"I'm sorry…I'm just…not very experienced."

He breathed a last puff of smoke and crushed the cigarette on the metal railing of the balcony.

"That's fine…how many men you been wit'?" He asked this most personal of questions so casually, like it was no big deal. She felt off balance again in that very particular way he tended to dislocate her.

"Been with?...I…I kissed a boy…once."

Remy froze, felt his stomach do a little flip. "You never been wit' anyone? Cuz I don't know if I believe dat."

"Well…what do you mean by 'been with'?"

He laughed, astonished, and ran his hand through his hair looking over her head at nothing in particular, suddenly unsure of what to do with her. He was used to an Anna that was self possessed, feisty, confident, wound tight but occasionally fun and generally sure of herself. This drunk and trembling virgin seemed a whole other person…and it confused him. He felt the wind kick up and slide along the side of the building, ruffling his hair right out of place again.

"Mebbe we go back to de ship after all…eh?"

"You don't wanna…" She read the look on his face, the distress, and she snapped out of it in an instant, like the recoil of a gun. All the softness left her and she straitened into the tough-as-nails captain of Rogue.

"Yeah I'll go back to the ship." She bit out and turned on her heels.

"Chere…wait. Don't be like dat." He grabbed her elbow but she shook him off angrily and stomped across the room with a slight weave in her step.

"Oh, don't worry about it Remy...I just didn't realize you invited me here to make me feel like an idiot!" She shouted over her shoulder before she jerked open the door and slammed it behind her.

* * *

Please Review.


	14. Chapter 14

Remy thought about following her but didn't know what he would say. It was probably best if she cooled off for a second. In any case, he'd gone months without getting laid and that was ending tonight. He threw his coat back on and went down to the bar where he'd already eyed a pretty waitress. _Every plan should have a backup_, and he smiled to himself.

* * *

Back on the ship, Rora was in her room asleep and Kurt sat in the viewing alcove reading. He was waiting up for Anna in true older brother fashion but it was late and he was tired and perhaps a little tipsy. His eyes flagged and his head bobbed until he passed into dreams right there in the soft leather chair.

He met a stewardess once, on a shuttle out of New York, with golden hair and a ready smile, beautiful pink lips shaped just so. Her name was Amanda and there was something about her face that he was never able to forget, something in its shape and in the set of her hazel eyes. They struck up a conversation and at the end of the flight, as they were all piling off, she slipped her phone number into his hand. Why had he never called her?

In his dream they talked as before but instead of slipping out of her life forever as he had done, he slipped her into the shuttle bathroom, picked her whole body up, set her down right on the sink edge. She gasped delightedly, whispered "What are you doing?" though her eyes sparkled, and he smiled and kissed her with all the violence a man may kiss a woman and keep her willing. Someone banged on the bathroom door a few times but he ignored it until it finally stopped. His arms went around her waist and hers went to his chest and she moaned into his mouth. It was all perfect. I was all too perfect.

Somewhere on the shuttle a child began to cry. Again he ignored it, but the formless sounds grew louder, shaped into the words and the words became his name over and over and over…

"Kuuuuuurt!"

He woke up just as Rora's screaming abruptly stopped and he heard the muted clanging of soft-soled boots on the catwalks and mumbled orders. He jerked forward to grab his rifle and flipped off the safety, resisting the urge to press his hands around the transducer to quiet the sound of its whine. He leveled the barrel on the back of the chair and the first fool came into view around the corner, wearing an all black uniform with a red insignia on it, a six tentacled skull. He squeezed the trigger and a bright bolt of plasma hit the hapless gendarme in the chest and toppled him over the railing to the floor below. Indistinct voices shouted and he could hear feet moving.

He moved to the wall and edged up to the corner, then shot blindly around it assuming there was another and was rewarded with the dull thud of a body hitting the catwalk. A few more stray shots met only air. He looked left and right then down into the bay where he could see one of them carrying the girl over his shoulders toward the open maw of the ramp. He ran and vaulted over the railing launching himself ten feet through the air to the dangling cargo chain which began to slide down quickly with his weight, clang-clang-clang-clang-clang. The man turned and fired at him with his free hand and nicked his body armor. Kurt spun on his chain and fired back, hitting him in the leg and forcing him to kneel. Then he jumped to the floor, charging him as he unceremoniously dropped Rora to the ground.

The whine of his rifle was audible again which meant it was recovering and that was fine. He ducked out of the way of the man's ceramic bullet and spun the rifle by the trigger hold and then the barrel in a carnival display of virtuosity, so that the butt of the weapon came up under the man's chin with enough force to pop some teeth out and break his jaw. The man howled in pain but his blood shot eyes stayed focused and he aimed again at Kurt who had simply beaten him to the punch at this point. Kurt fired a low blast into his abdomen knocking him into the wall and rushed over to close the bay door. Pulled out his phone, typed in PANIC2 and pressed send. He rushed to Rora's side and checked her pulse then left her lying there to sweep the rest of the ship.

He heard a comm link crackle on the man on the floor.

"Gauntlet 6 this is Gauntlet 1. What is the status of the ship? Over."

He pressed the small receiver on the man's arm and suppressed his accent.

"Gauntlet 1 this is Gauntlet 6. The ship is empty. What are your instructions? Over."

"Standby Gauntlet 6."

He sighed and his head dropped. He ripped the receiver off of the body and carried it with him to look for the fourth man. Because three was just too strange a number…there had to be a fourth…somewhere.

* * *

Anna stomped angrily down the hall and took the stairs down seven flights so that no one in the elevators would see her flushed face and her wet eyes. Somewhere between the second and third floor she stopped to sit on the stairs and reflect, to gather her thoughts and her feelings. She felt like she'd ruined something, by losing her temper, by being drunk, by being stupid in general or when it came to this man in particular.

Maybe it was a dumb idea anyways. He'd as much as said that he would stay in Madripoor to disappear from his ex-comrades. But even if she never saw him again she couldn't help what she wanted, and again it seemed stupid, to get hung up on a vagabond with a price on his head. And yet she was.

She let loose a torrent of tears and shuddering sobs that were as much a product of her years of self pity as they were of a single rejection. And when she was done she felt better, strong again, as she should be, as she was. She stood, straightened her shirt and jacket, wiped her eyes…everything was fine…fine.

Her phone alarm went off, not the delicate chime of her alerts, but a constant buzzing screech. She didn't even have to look at it. She flew down the remaining stairs in a second and out of the stairwell door. Tipsy revelers stopped and looked at her as she sprinted down the wide marble hallway, past tall windows that looked into bars, restaurants, shops, and on out into the city.

* * *

In the bar the waitress was already sidled up close to Remy, putting her hand on his knee, sliding it up. Their conversation had bottomed out and entirely turned to innuendo after ten minutes. He was whispering some obscene promise in her ear when he saw Anna through the windows, running for her life, clipping a shopper who fell and spilled clothes all over the cream-colored stone floor. She didn't even seem to notice, and when he saw her he fell silent mid sentence.

"What is it?" said the waitress.

"Huh."

"When we get up to the room you're gonna…what?"

He smiled at her playfully, put his hands on her hips. "Why don't you head up there and wait for me…den I'll show you." He opened his wallet and handed her a room key. "814."

"Hmm." It was half hum half closed mouth laugh. She lowered her head and put the corner of the card in her teeth. "Why don't you come up with me?"

He brushed her hair out of her face, tucked it behind her ear as he had done for Anna less than half an hour ago. It was striking how all these gestures of tenderness could mean anything.

"I got somet'ing I gotta do first p'tit."

She made that pleasant humming sound again.

"I like it when you call me p'tit."

He smiled wickedly.

"I'm gonna call you dat and some more in a little bit, now go on."

She swung her hips this way and that biting her lip, then spun around and walked away sashaying as she went. She turned left out of the bar and headed to the elevators, winking back at him as the doors closed on her.

Remy sighed quietly as he watched her go. When he left the bar he turned right.

* * *

Please Review.


	15. Chapter 15

Anna's lungs burned from running but she was so frantic that she observed the pain more than felt it. Dark alleys passed in a blur, the late night remnants of the stalls gave color to the stone walls of New Madripoor's market district. Remy had to give up the pretense of stealth and flat out chase her as her feet beat out a merciless rhythm on the cobblestones. At last the buildings receded behind her and she came to the open fields of sea grass surrounding the airfield. The grass smacked wetly against her shins as she ran and eventually the sound gave way to the soft clapping of asphalt.

She shuddered to a halt at the passenger access door of the ship, sweating and panting. For the first time she turned to look behind her and saw Remy as he caught up to her, but she had no breath to speak nor time to explain nor even a moment to register surprise. She tapped in the code and the door descended, then she took the six steps three at a time up to the small airlock and entered another code at the console there. When that too opened she stepped into the brightness of the bay and squinted. She could see a crumpled body of a man in uniform on the far side of the bay and knew immediately that it wasn't Kurt. Remy stepped behind her and breathlessly panted, "Chere?"

"Shhh." She held her hand up and half turned her head back to him. "It's so quiet."

He listened to the eerie silence with her.

"Let's go…back to de hotel…Chere?"

She gave no answer.

"Chere?"

She craned her head around to look at him with wide eyes. "I have to take the ship up."

"Non…leave wit' me…now." He put his hand on her elbow. She didn't shrug it off this time.

"Please!…" She practically wept, so plaintive was her voice. "Once we're in the air no one can hurt us."

He scowled at her disbelieving, feeling in his bones that they were making a terrible mistake and pitying her innocence, wondering where Rora was with a pang in his heart, wondering if Anna cared through her haze of panic. He dropped his hand.

She took his silence for assent and turned, reached to the side of him to press the toggle switch on the inside console and close the access door. They stepped out from under the overhanging catwalk swiftly and quietly like church mice. Anna's eyes darted every which way. Remy looked right in front of him, tight mouthed, but all his attention was in his periphery. He didn't like how exposed they were and he decided that if he ever designed cargo ships the stairs to the cockpit would not extend from the open bay.

They reached the cockpit without any further sign of worry but she hadn't thought this through. If she knew where Kurt and Rora were she would seal the cockpit and open the bay doors when they got out of the atmosphere just to make sure no one was lurking around. But that wouldn't work if Kurt or Rora were lying concussed in the far reaches of the ship somewhere. They were still going to need to search everything. She sat in her seat and started flipping switches. The dash came alive with LEDs and the hum of electricity but when she pushed the throttle to spin up the engine…nothing happened.

A shiver ran through her body. She swallowed.

"What is it?" Asked Remy.

A radio down in the bay crackled and they both jumped and turned to look behind them.

"Only two of them." They heard a man's voice speaking. Anna turned back to the controls and hit a button only to be shocked again when the cockpit door didn't slide shut.

"Oh god…the interface bus." She dove to the foot of her seat and slid a silver panel out of the way chucking it behind her with a loud metallic clatter.

Scores of heavy footfalls rang everywhere, closer and closer. Remy's eyes were half lidded. He smiled sardonically and put his hands in his lap. He knew it was too late. He was annoyed and bored by the prospect of breaking out of another jail cell. Annoyed with himself for being here when he should be sweating in the arms of a casino waitress.

"Stand up and put your hands where I can see them." The guard yelled. Anna choked on her tears and crawled back slowly, releasing the connector of a brightly colored ribbon of wires, then she rose to stand but was grabbed by rough hands before ever raising her arms.

* * *

They were frog-marched outside, separated, told to lie face down on the ground, fingers spread wide over their heads. From her vantage point she could make out the hovering chassis of several armored vans. There was a constant chatter of serious conversation and an unnatural white light everywhere. She lay there for about fifteen minutes and at last a man stood over her, pulled her hands behind her back, zip tied her wrists together. He stood her up and walked her to one of the vans, which had lowered to the ground for loading. She stepped into it with her captors aid and could see Kurt's legs sticking out of the darkness where he lay on his side, bloodied and unmoving.

She fell to her knees and yelled his name, nudging him with her knee, falling and half laying on him. Trying to feel his pulse with her face at his throat, but it was pointless.

"Kurt?" Her cries softened to pleading whimpers. "I'm so sorry!" She cried and nuzzled her face into his arm, noting that at least he was warm and repeating her unheard apology as the door slammed shut behind her.

* * *

Raven's phone had gone off during the meeting, vibrating three times in succession and then falling silent. Five minutes later it repeated the same pattern. She was forced to excuse herself and that irritated her to no end. She clomped angrily through the anteroom, down the alabaster hallway to her cavernous office and finally looked at her phone with a curse.

Imperious. That was the word for Raven Darkholm. Competent. Intelligent. Frightening. Those words as well, but Imperious covered all the bases. It was what one felt immediately in her presence. Even the Cabinet members she worked with, though technically her superiors, felt the weight of her power. And she had a most impressive suite of powers when it came to politics: Influence, charisma, and money.

Nur was up for election this year and no one would dare run against him whom he hadn't himself placed as a puppet for the sake of illusion. It would be years before anyone could run against him in earnest, and so all of her efforts were bent towards thwarting him in subtle ways, embarrassing him, weakening him, strengthening his most promising rivals, to make room for some idiot to be the first to challenge him. That man or woman would die, and probably the next after that, but eventually his political base would erode…either that or civil war…and war was to be avoided at all cost. Even if it required more targeted sacrifices. Even if it required her own children.

Already the nets were cast far afield and drawn in by imperceptible degrees. Her avatars slept. A brotherhood of dissidents. They served tea in the ministry chambers, they did paperwork in fancy offices lined with burlwood, in laboratories funded by Nur's government, a few wore the KAS uniform, a few Dark Star, and two of them in particular hauled freight all over the galaxy, just waiting…waiting for the moment she needed them.

When _she_ needed _them._

Not the other way around.

* * *

Thanks to my reviewers. Lovely Smile and Me Voila in particular.

I do have to say, I feel like I've veered away from Rogue quite a bit as well...I needed a barrier to touch that wasn't her mutation and I gave her a bunch of psychological features to that end, but she seems to have developed a different personality to the one I had envisioned. More dualistic for sure...I like this version of her in any case though she isn't really the quintessential Rogue.


	16. Chapter 16

She cried all her tears out in a whitewashed room, an interrogation room she assumed, though there was no mirror or video camera that she could see. There was a stainless steel table and two stainless steel chairs but she chose to sit in the corner on the floor where she could curl into the wall and feel the slightest hint of comfort.

When the door finally did open with a deep _chnk_, she didn't seem startled. She didn't even look up.

A man seated himself in the chair closest to her and scooted it around 90 degrees to face her. He didn't bother introducing himself.

"Well Ms. Wagner. There isn't much to you is there?" A soft voice. A gentle voice. The practiced voice of an interrogator.

She knit her brows and looked at him for the first time, a handsome, youngish officer dressed in a well cut green uniform, so dark it appeared black at first glance. High on the side of his arm she could see the red skull with its six tentacles, the emblem of Hydra. He was leaning over with his elbows on his knees and peered at her over a thin manila folder.

"No there isn't." She said at last, leaning her head back against the wall.

"Hmm." He half laughed. "There's virtually nothing on your phone. Barely any contacts. Unusual for a young twenty-something."

Bitterness crept into her voice. "Ah don't like a lot of old messages cluttering up my phone. And Ah don't have a lot of contacts in my phone because Ah don't have a lot of contacts in my life. " A half lie, but true enough. Her phone deleted messages after 30 minutes for security and her contacts she knew to keep in her head if they were worth keeping at all. The only exception was Remy, but she supposed she could remember his number now too if she liked. All the other numbers in there were business contacts for work, and none of them would raise the least suspicion.

"It has subspace capabilities. I've never seen that on a civilian phone." He commented almost to himself, but she knew she was meant to respond.

"Ah have a shipping business. Ah need to coordinate across planetary time zones sometimes." Her voice smoothed over with calm. There was no point in bitterness. There was no point in any emotion anymore.

He seemed to think about that, nodding silently to himself. "Well then, I'm just going to cut to it Ms. Wagner. Did you know you were traveling with a deserter and infamous larcenist?"

"No."

He made a note.

"Where did you pick him up?"

"Kitra." She should have said station 12. Kurt wouldn't say Kitra. Kurt would say station 12…if Kurt were alive. But it didn't matter anyways. The Hydra gendarme would search the ship. They would come to the white door and it would refuse to open for them, so they would blow it up. They would walk down the round white corridor and their guns and rank insignia would lift off of them, pull away, fly into the banks upon banks of adamantium magnets, destroying the invisible prison, and then the dark secret in the heart of Rogue would expand outward in a flash, absorbing and annihilating anything and everything it touched. It would happen soon. Any second now.

"Where were you taking him?"

She blinked. "St. Marge. Right after this job."

He bent to write something again.

"What did he tell you about the girl."

And Rora…she would die too.

"He said she was his niece."

The questions were simple, perfunctory. He nodded and mmhm-ed at each one. Sometimes he took notes. Another five minutes of questions passed until someone knocked at the door and opened it quickly, surprising her questioner. He stood up, sputtered, snapped to attention.

"As you were sergeant. I'll be directing this interrogation from here on out. May I have your notes?"

"Of course Major."

The younger man was obviously confused but obeyed and edged out of the room in a hurry. The major sat down in his place and stared at her for a few moments.

So this was his ticket out. This broken looking girl and her equally innocent looking brother. How many years had he toiled for Hydra only to be denied promotion at the last moment. His retirement would be forfeit if he was passed over again, and that was the most likely scenario. But…if he helped this…child…he could forget all about his pension and still live in splendor. He could retire to the southern Isles and farm pearls and fish for Marlin until he died like the old man in the book. His wife would be pleased with him, his grandchildren could go to fancy private schools. And truly, what did any of this have to do with Hydra, with Madripoor, with N'Gari? It was all some affair to do with Nur and his Union so it wasn't even a betrayal.

He shifted in his seat, closed the folder and set it on the table.

"Well you certainly sang like a canary." He baited her a little, just for fun, but she didn't rise to it. She appeared serene in a sad and oddly unsettling way, folded in on herself, vacant.

He cleared his throat.

"Madame Viper likes to keep a…" he gestured with his hand, showing her an open palm, "friendly relationship with merchants. It is the basis of a strong economy after all." He rolled his eyes unconsciously. "So we will finish up this paperwork and have you on your way as soon as we can. Do you need any water? Perhaps a female officer can escort you to the restroom?" He offered with forced politeness, noticing the slightest blush of life returning to her face.

She was still for a few seconds, so still that he wondered if she had even heard him, but then she spun her head around to face him, surprising him.

"Has my ship been searched?"

That was her first question? He half smiled…_smuggler._

"Just a walk through, nothing…invasive." He smiled, falsely sure of himself. "Though we cloned your hard drive as per protocol. I'm sure you have no objections."

She sniffed and nodded. Looked away again.

Is my brother alright?

"He's fine…just some bruises." An understatement, but he wasn't here to have a conversation and he was bored by the prospect of answering her many questions. He stood up and slid the chair back into its place.

"What about the thief and the girl."

"One of your Union contractors paid good money for them. I suggest you forget you ever knew them." He was at the door now.

"What do they want with the girl?" She spit out as his hand pressed on the door handle.

His repressed a sneer. It wasn't often he met people who dared not to address him with the respect due his rank.

"I haven't the faintest idea." And he closed the door on her.

* * *

An hour later, an hour of dizzying relief, and she and Kurt were dropped off on a street in lowtown. Kurt leaned on her hard then slid to the ground and sat running his palms along the length of his calves.

"You ok?" She asked, concerned.

He nodded. "They kicked me in the legs." He said evenly. Doubtless they had kicked him all over, but there was some unspoken rule of cruelty among Hydra's foot soldiers, that if you wanted to brutalize someone without killing them, you could take your steel toed boots to their legs with impunity. Of course, broken bones and ruptured arteries still occurred but that was acceptable.

She looked away from him, directing her angry eyes to the fading stars. Kurt of all the people she knew didn't deserve to be hurt. He was gentle and kind, but he was always the first one to throw himself in harms way if he thought he needed to. He was noble in that self-sacrificing way that hero's and martyrs are extolled for. But it made her fear for him, and still more, it made her feel guilty, because she couldn't ever deserve such a protector.

A rickshaw trundled down the street and she raised her hand to hail it. The ride back to the ship was peaceful. She knew she should hurry the driver, but her nihilistic hangover lingered, and oddly, it made her feel stronger, more able to face the wrath of Raven yet to come.

The sun was just cresting the horizon when they arrived at the airfield and her load of frozen fish was idling alongside her ship in a refrigerated truck. She had to laugh to herself. _Back to business – just like that. _

She paid the rickshaw driver and helped Kurt into the ship and up to the viewing lounge where he stretched out on the couch with an involuntary whimper that made her cringe. She brought him some water and some low-grade painkillers then returned to the driver of the truck and made her apologies for being late.

It wasn't until half of the cases were loaded that she noticed the mid sized shuttle parked 500 meters down the tarmac. She could barely make out the name from the distance, but she was absolutely certain that the emblem painted fore of the swept wings was an eight-pointed star.

* * *

Thank you to Me Voila and Lovely Smile. What do you guys think of the pacing? Does it feel like the story is rushed?


	17. Chapter 17

TL;DR - Exposition. Sorry for the short chapter. Thanks as always to Me Voila, Lovely Smile, and now Ludi.

* * *

Motion sensing lights flickered on as Raven and Emma entered a bunker office outside of Jura. It was cold, having reverted to the temperature of the earth after months of disuse.

"He said that he can't afford to continue supporting us if this election cycle doesn't pan out." Said Emma as she walked across the room to seat herself in a leather armchair.

Raven paused at her desk. "What were his exact words."

Emma flipped through some pages and quoted directly from the meeting minutes. "Oyama Heavy Industries cannot continue to make contributions of this size to so many recipients. It is an unsustainable burden on the corporation that the board of directors can no longer support."

Raven seemed unconcerned. She slid a wall panel aside to reveal a wet bar and reached into a freezer for a perfectly round ice cube which she placed into a cut crystal rocks glass.

"Do you want anything to drink Emma?"

It was generally wise to refuse such offers from Raven. She would put you at ease to learn your secrets, your motivations, your deepest desires only to use them later to her advantage. But Emma was able to resist and parry these attempts at psychological warfare. It had made their relationship one of mutual respect over the years, though Raven would never decline an opportunity to manipulate someone if they presented it.

"I'll have some water if you don't mind."

Raven nodded with her back turned as she crushed a crystalized orange slice into the bottom of her glass and poured a finger of whiskey over it. "An Old Fashioned without fresh oranges is just ridiculous. I should rename this cocktail." She turned and handed Emma a similarly ornate glass filled with water then sat down behind her desk

"I thought an Old Fashioned only used the rind?" Emma commented lightly.

The older woman smirked. "I didn't realize you were an aficionado."

"I know a few things." She retorted with a fleeting smile, waiting for her employer to get back to business.

"Well..." Raven began, leaning back in her chair and looking up at the ceiling for a moment of thoughtfulness then returning her gaze to Emma. "This changes nothing."

"How so? If we lose this backer two election cycles from now Christian will no longer be in position to run for a regional seat."

"Not so…for several reasons. First, the name Oyama."

"What of it?"

Raven let her face show a bare instant of annoyance. "He's given us a pragmatic reason for withdrawing support, Tatamae...the appearance of truth. What he really means is that he is losing faith in our abilities and if we want to maintain his loyalty we need to hurry up, Honne...truth. But no matter where he places his faith, no one is offering him a better chance at revenge than we are. And lets be honest…its revenge he wants. He could attain a cabinet position without all of this back door dealing and for less cost, but he's playing the long game. He wants Essex dead for personal reasons and Nur dead for political reasons and he wants a new government into the bargain so that he can have a hand in remaking the rules. No one is offering him all that but us. Second, if he withdraws support now and we are successful, he will not reap any of the benefits when the power change occurs. And third, he has plenty of money…an obscene amount….his board of directors are all puppets.

"So we do nothing?"

Raven laughed…"No…in the end Oyama only urges us to follow our own desires. It has taken too long already. No one could have anticipated that Buckman's tenure in the Cabinet would be so…lengthy. He should be dead by now of natural causes, but doubtless Essex has something to do with his freakish longevity. Sadly we may have to help him along to the next phase of his life's journey."

Emma nodded, understanding. "Do you want me to have Logan get in contact with Kurt?"

"Not yet. Rogue ran into some trouble in New Madripoor. She should be heading back now. Prepare a dossier on Edward Buckman and make it damning." She sneered a little. "Kurt always needs to be _convinced_."

* * *

Hope I got Honne and Tatamae right.

Please Review


	18. Chapter 18

She sat on the ramp and looked for a long time. They had just landed, she could tell. A figure came down the ramp and laid chocks on either side of the landing gear. They would be here a while and it should have been a small comfort to her, knowing that she had time if she wanted to do something, if she wanted to make a move, but fear had compressed every other feeling in her so that she earnestly considered taking off, turning her back on everything, on the thief and the little girl, and going back to her normal life. But there was a barrier between her and that decision the shape and nature of which she could not discern. Perhaps because her life, even on the other side of that choice, was its own kind of misery. Day after day of practiced isolation with the occasional job for Raven and the sure knowledge that someday she would be found out, tracked down like a dog, and killed, or, more likely, sent to a reeducation camp.

And then there was the fact that she didn't know anything else beyond this life. Raven and Kurt were all she really had and for a little while she had a charming con man and a little sister of sorts. Still, she only needed to be convinced to act the hero at times like these, when she was hollowed out; so empty her emotions seemed to echo inside of her.

Well, if she was going to die, she wasn't going to do it in a camp, that was for damn sure. And she felt comfortable speaking for Kurt on the issue as well.

So death was certain…not the sort of death that all men must face etc…but the glorious or ignominious death of a freedom fighter. Fast in a thunderous explosion of radiation and lights and subatomic particles, or slow, starving over long months of work and torture in what was essentially a prison…

Something distracted her then from her silent soliloquy…she felt a hand on her knee and she looked down to see…nothing there…yet the sensation persisted and dragged all the way up to her hip with an eerie sensuousness that made her shiver. How many days had it been now? Only one. No. Two. She had forgotten yesterday. But still that seemed too fast. _It must be the stress._ She went to the bathroom and looked in the mirror, raised her hand to it to open the medicine cabinet but stopped when she saw her own eyes staring back at her.

_You can tell can't you? You can tell what's real and what's not._

Her hand slid along the edge of the mirror and slipped off, down to the sink.

Almost reflexively she washed her hands.

* * *

Remy was still sitting in his white cell hours later. No coat. No Shoes. His pat down had been thorough enough to divest him of his lock picks so he sat brooding, casting his mind into the future, imagining the scenario that would provide the most opportunity for escape.

A guard, or an officer, or a sergeant…he couldn't tell…escorted him to the restroom and back once and on his way he passed a general confinement area like a cage that the guards could see into, full of drunks and petty criminals. He looked in it for the pilot and Kurt and the girl but to no avail. It unsettled him that he wasn't in there. It meant they thought there was something noteworthy about him and that idea twisted in the back of his mind.

He spent the rest of his little foray casing the interior of what seemed to be a militarized police station, noting the pale fingers of dawn creeping into the sky on the other side of a row of small porthole windows. When he returned to the cell he lay down on the floor, laid his head on his arm and prepared to sleep if only for a few minutes, to gather his strength.

It seemed only moments later that he heard someone at the door and he shot up and stood in the middle of the empty room, but whoever it was was struggling with the handle and it gave him a moment to think, to arrange himself casually against the wall, knees bent…no…just one knee bent. There. Only then when he sat quietly for a moment did he recognize the tell tale clicking and scraping was not the sound of a hand struggling with a key…it was the questing of a long pointed needle of metal looking for the pins of the lock. His breath stilled in his throat and his heart raced and he stared wide eyed and closed mouthed at the door handle until he heard it…_click_…soft and musical. The most delicate percussion. And the door fell open on its hinge just an inch as quietly as a leaf turning on its stem.

* * *

She was still staring at herself in the mirror when she heard Kurt call out to her in a voice of rising distress, so she hurried out and along the catwalk to where he lay. His face was pinched with pain and he had turned awkwardly on his side grasping his thigh with both hands.

"What is it?" She asked with breathless concern.

"It hurts." He bit out, now gritting his teeth. "Something is wrong." And he gasped a little.

"Is it broken?"

"I don't know!" He hissed, not looking at her and it made her take a step back and grow calm. Kurt didn't yell. He never yelled. And not at her, but if ever she had seen him _want_ to…it was now.

"Do you wanna go to the hospital?" She asked, hoping he would say no.

"I want to get home and I want to see Hank…just….just…go!" But he cried out again at the end of his choppy sentence and she knew she had to do something for him, because they weren't going home yet. She needed to figure some things out first.

"Don't worry. This is New Madripoor." She said almost to herself. "I'll get you some _good_ drugs." And without another word between them she turned and left.

Out at the flight line perimeter there was a smattering of rickshaw and cart-bike drivers waiting for the odd fare into town. She hopped onto the back of a cart bike and urgently barked out "Any pharmacy in Low Town." as she unceremoniously wrapped her arms around the thin man's waist. The driver wasted no time, pulled his motorcycle up and revved off with all the hurry she could hope for.

She paid the driver extra to wait for her outside the dimly lit store. It's shelves lined so closely together that she had to side step through them. She let her fingers read for her along the row of drugs starting with F trying to remember the names of the good drugs. Felbatol…Fentanyl…Fermodan…Her finger traced back a few. Fentanyl. The package it came in was worn and bent as though it had traveled far and inside it were a dozen square foil packages each containing a transdermal patch. She knew from experience that this would work and from that same experience her fingers itched to try one herself. To pry open the plastic and foil and slap one on her wrist for the road, to take the edge off a long and frankly miserable day.

She grabbed the package and headed to the tiny counter where a wizened old man slouched over a fablet watching a streaming game of soccer. Her eye caught the "Sol" of a bottle out of the corner of her eye and stopped in her tracks.

'Solian 200' it read. 200 was too small a dose by a third, but there was no time to ponder. She grabbed it, opened it where she stood, and dry swallowed one of the tablets. The old man stood suddenly and glowered, but the next moment she slammed the bottle and the package down on the counter and flashed her credit card.

* * *

Author's Note - Well, this story has gone off the rails, as I mentioned before, to the point where I may write some of the alternate versions and release them as Etude 5.1…5.2…etc. Would any one be interested in that? (Not that it wont take me forever to finish this one.) And as always please review.

Oh...and sorry for making you wait Lovely Smile. I always know to get on the ball when you start asking where I am.


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